Needle and Thread
by DD Agent
Summary: Sharon prepares the Popes for Halloween, and telling the new Chief she's dating Will. Set after 6.10


**Needle and Thread by DD Agent**

_I do not own The Closer or any of its characters, or its settings._

Set after 6.10. A loose running sequel to previous fic "Pumpkin", but you don't need to read it at all to understand this. : ) Hope you enjoy!

Will came home after a rough day dealing with the new Chief of Police and carrying out his policies. Sighing, he pulled off his coat. His friend in New York was telling him earlier how cold the city was this time of year, people being wrapped up in coats and scarves. As he hung up his jacket, he heard giggling coming from the living room.

"Melanie?" She was his Nanny - a former UCLA student who picked his children up from school and looked after them until he came home from work.

"Guess again."

He went into the sitting room and saw Sharon Raydor kneeling in front of his ten year old daughter Caitlin, adjusting her black skirt with pins to make sure the hem was level. His son Brendan was fiddling with the sleeves of his torn shirt, rubbing at the fake bolts that had been stuck in his neck. They grinned when they saw their father and ran to hug him. He gripped his children tightly, although his crisp white shirt ended up stained with green make up.

"Where's Melanie?" Will asked Sharon as she joined the kids in hugging him.

She snorted. "I told babysitter Barbie to take the afternoon off. We've got no active cases, so I went to pick the kids up and went Halloween shopping with a very enthusiastic Simon. I hope that's okay."

"Yeah it's fine," Will smiled, rubbing some of the makeup off of Brendan's face. It was well known that Sharon's Lieutenant Stoker was a Halloween fanatic, so he would be happy to help Sharon and the kids get kitted out for the holiday. They looked good as well, quite scary. "You guys getting ready for trick or treating?"

Caitlin, his youngest dressed as a witch, grinned. "Uh huh! Sharon's going to dress up and take us round all the places and get us lots of candy!"

"I hope that's okay," Sharon admitted, hoping that she hadn't stepped out of line with Will's kids. She knew that when they were younger, Caitlin and Brendan used to go around with their mother while their father was working, and since their parents divorced, they hadn't gone since. However, it had been Caitlin's suggestion the other weekend when Sharon was teaching them baseball that they went this year, and the idea had festered since.

She had her doubts, but Will just smiled and kissed her on the cheek. Brendan and Caitlin made faces, like they always did, but in truth they were happy to see their father happy. "Sounds good to me! I shall be there in costume to hold the candy bags." He grinned and put an arm around Sharon. "Why don't you two wash up and then we can have snacks?"

As the kids rushed upstairs to get changed into their regular clothes and scrub the makeup off of Brendan's face, Will held Sharon, burying his head into the crook of her shoulder. They swayed for a moment, clinging onto each other, enjoying the peace and quiet.

X

She was in the bathroom brushing her teeth when Will came in looking for floss. A completely domestic scene, one she found she quite enjoyed. She had always hated the idea of marrying someone, having kids and then losing who you were in the banality of it all. But Sharon found that instead she was discovering different parts of herself that she liked, like her maternal side in taking care of Caitlin and Brendan.

Of course the only people who knew they were dating were his kids, Simon and Claudia who had been sworn to secrecy and the teachers at the school who saw them pick up Caitlin and Brendan together. The former Chief had known that they had been dating, but now there was a new Chief that had no idea about the relationship between his Assistant Chief and head of FID.

They hadn't planned for it to happen. They had gone out for drinks before Christmas, to commiserate the Ally Moore situation. He had invited her over for the holiday, just the two of them and they had ended up making love for the first time. Their relationship muddled along, secret kisses and romantic dinners until she met his kids for the first time at Easter. By the time Will had put himself in for Chief, she had been staying around his house, and when Tommy Delk was announced as the new Chief of the LAPD, she was practically living there.

"Do you like Melanie?" Will asked, cleaning in between his teeth. He had noticed that Sharon had been picking the kids up whenever she was on her 'off' rotation from work, more than was necessary considering he paid someone to do that.

Sharon rolled her eyes, finally getting to share her feelings. "No, I do not. She's a little slut who wants to sleep with you, and I don't like that."

"So you're jealous of her?" Will teased.

Sharon hit his chest and finished brushing her teeth. "Yes, I am jealous of tight little twenty something's who are good with your kids."

Will finished flossing and put both his arms around Sharon, kissing her on the cheek and looking at them both in the mirror. "I don't plan to take up with some twenty something. And you are incredible with my kids; you're an incredible police officer and an incredible woman." He kissed her neck again, moving his hands down to graze over her waist and towards her hips. She shivered in anticipation. "I don't plan to ever give you up. Plus, you've put your house on the market now, haven't you?"

She nodded. They had decided that she would move into his place to give the kids as little disruption as possible. She spent nearly every night there anyway; it was just making things official. The next order of business was to tell Chief Delk what was going on, but both were reluctant to do so. They knew that Delk could tell them to end their relationship quite easily, and if so their jobs would be on the line if they refused to stop seeing each other. It was a tricky situation.

Sharon switched off the bathroom light and moved under the sheets, waiting for Will to get under there with her. It was something she hadn't thought she would ever need, someone to be sleeping beside her. But she found that on the few nights she needed to sleep at her place, she ended up tossing and turning; missing the protective warmth of Will behind her.

"Have you scheduled a meeting with Delk yet? We need to get this done before it goes into November and he's been Chief for way over a month."

Will stilled behind her. "I'll get it done, I promise."

She turned around to face him. "You are going to do it, aren't you? We talked about this when he became Chief; we decided it would be better coming from you. If he finds out and we haven't told him we'll be investigated by Internal Affairs, we're too high up to mess around."

"I know, I know. I'm just scared he's going to say no," Will said, but something in his tone made Sharon shift away from him, glad she had kept the lamps on to see his face and the lie present there.

"Bullshit," Sharon whispered. "You don't want to do it just in case he fires you for us being together. You don't want to lose your job because all your hours sucking up to him for the past month to make sure you keep it will all be a waste."

She sat up in bed, pulling her knees up to her chin. She turned to Will, who couldn't keep his regret out of his face. She had hit a nerve, his face curling in anger.

"Who says that if he gave us the choice I'd choose you?" Will stated, immediately regretting the words but there was no taking them back.

Sharon looked like she had been slapped. "If you don't want me to move in, if you don't want us to do this, just say. I don't want to be in half a relationship."

She turned off the lights and moved to the edge of the bed, not wanting to be near him. Her grandmother had always warned her about going to bed angry with someone. The rare times she had got into a fight with her father as a child, she had sat on the stairs crying until he would come and find her and she would apologise. But she didn't know what to say to Will, so she just tried desperately to fall asleep and not cry. An hour or so later, she heard him get up and go to the bathroom, and alone she finally closed her eyes.

X

Will had got no sleep the night before, in his mind he was going through what Sharon had said to him, and what he had said back. It had been a tough month, and he was still not sure whether he would be keeping his job. Delk announced that all his new changes would be done for the New Year, so they could start afresh in 2011. His relationship with Sharon had been a blessing, and he had enjoyed being with her, had fallen in love with her. His problem was that he was uncertain whether he could be the same man without his job, even though he knew he wouldn't be the same without her.

"RARRR!"

He jumped out of his skin as two little monsters jumped into his office. Brendan was fully kitted out like Frankenstein, and Caitlin was dressed as a witch with scary fingernails. Sharon had certainly done a good job on getting the children ready for Halloween. He moved around his desk and saw Sharon enter his office. She had been out of the house by the time he had woken up that morning, not giving him a chance to explain and apologise for his words.

"Hey guys, why aren't we in school?"

Sharon moved her fingers down and pulled down Brendan's mouth. He made a scary face that Sharon replicated. "I just picked them up for their dentist appointment. Its Halloween dress up day at school today, so we've got them all kitted out to scare their teachers. And the dentist."

Will moved over and looked at his two little monsters. He pressed his lips down on Sharon's, and thankfully she didn't pull away. "I'm sorry about last night. I just…without this job I don't know what I am. And if I lose it then I'm going to be more of a failure then I was not getting onto the damn shortlist."

Sharon nodded, understanding. "Hey you two; check your lunchboxes and see what I've put in there," Sharon said, and the two kids went to Will's desk to see what Sharon had given them for lunch. She put her arms around Will's neck and kissed him softly on the mouth, stroking his cheek. "Look at those two kids Will, look at me. We don't think you're a failure. You maybe had the wrong approach but you've been doing the job of the Chief for years now. You work damn hard; being Assistant Chief is nothing to sneer at."

She kissed him again. "I love you, but make the damn appointment and tell Delk. I know you love me, and I know you want us to be together but I don't want you stuck thinking that your life is a wreck because you didn't get the job you wanted. You have me, you have Frankenstein and the Blair Witch, and you will soon have the respect of the LAPD when they realise they made a mistake putting in Delk instead of you."

He smiled, cupping her cheek. "There is no doubt in my mind that I could ever give you up." Will kissed her, clinging onto her waist and holding her close. He couldn't live without her, didn't want to, didn't think he even could. As his mouth moved over lips, he left her breathless. Immediately his mind started to think about make up sex, and as she giggled into his collar, he could tell she was having the same thoughts.

They were jerked out of their reunion when his kids made their scary sounds again and they turned to see that Chief Delk had come into Will's office and had been scared by the two kids baring their teeth. He was looking at his two officers, wrapped up in each other, with a strange expression on his face. Sharon bit her lip, but Will's grip just tightened on Sharon's waist.

"Morning Chief Delk, I was just coming to see you. Captain Raydor was popping in with my kids before going off to the dentist. Guys, say hello to Chief Delk."

Caitlin and Brendan grabbed their backpacks and joined Sharon and Will. They waved at Chief Delk before returning to their shy selves. Delk smiled at the two children before turning to his two officers. They could see he was about to say something, so Will decided to get in there first so they had a chance to explain. "The reason why I was coming over was that I was hoping, sir, that you'd like to come to a dinner party that me and Sharon are throwing in a few weeks time. It's a celebration, she's moving in with me and the kids. We hope you can come."

The Chief nodded slowly, taking it all in. He hesitated for a moment before smiling. "That's wonderful, I'll be happy to attend, just give the date to my secretary." He looked towards Sharon whose knuckles were going white, gripping Will's hand. "How are things in FID Captain? I know it's slow at the moment but I'm sure you'll have a few more cases when the holiday season begins. I really want to bolster Internal Affairs, get more personnel. FID is one of the things that is definitely staying. I'll leave you to it Will, we'll talk later. Goodbye Captain, bye kids."

As Delk walked away, Sharon flung her arms around Will and kissed him hard. He laughed and exhaled, happy that it was all over and he got to keep his job and his girl. Will could see that Sharon was calming down and he chuckled, smiling. "Guess I wasn't the only one worried about losing their job, huh?"

"Well…" Sharon giggled, noticing that Will was shaking his head at her. "No one else would have my detectives."

"This is true." He kissed Sharon again. "Guess we have to plan a dinner party now. We'll talk about it when we get home; and we can celebrate the fact that our relationship is legitimate once again. Good luck at the dentist you two, give me a hug."

They hugged their father, and Brendan patted the pumpkin that was on his father's desk before the two children walked out. Sharon kissed Will again, stroking his cheek. "I love you." She looked towards his desk. "See you got a pumpkin too, huh? They were all over Major Crimes when I went up there yesterday."

"Yeah I did." He smiled. "Have a good day; I'll see you when I get home. I love you too babe."

Sharon waved him goodbye, heading out for her day off. With no active cases, she worked her one week on, one week off system when it was convenient. As she walked out of Will's office with the two kids, two figures dressed as Freddy Kruger and the _Scream _killer jumped in front of them. She jumped; the two kids yelped and started to giggle, not getting the costumes. Claudia and Simon pulled off the masks, and Sharon hit the latter on the arm.

"How many kids do I have? Don't make me have to come in because Cold Case Division wants you off the premises," Sharon warned, and her two detectives laughed.

She continued to escort the kids to the dentists; feeling like a weight had been lifted. She could feel Will's gaze on her as she walked away, and when she turned back she could see him smiling at her, looking at her with all the love in the world. The kids just shook their heads and started to discuss whether they would get any sweets at the dentists.


End file.
